


Sleep

by Vulcan409



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Accepting grief, M/M, Nightmares, Pre-Relationship, Sleeplessness, accepting pain, draco in the bathroom, eighth year
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-20
Updated: 2018-10-20
Packaged: 2019-08-04 20:05:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,391
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16353380
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vulcan409/pseuds/Vulcan409
Summary: Harry is scared of sleeping, and goes around the castle corridors. Unsurprisingly, he runs into Draco.





	Sleep

"Oh, get over yourself, Potter; you aren't the center of the world, you know."

Draco walked out of the library, leaving an utterly surprised Harry to his thoughts. Harry didn't know what was up with Malfoy, what he meant by it, or even if the comment was truly directed at him.

Later, while talking to Ginny, she said something like 'you take yourself too seriously', and it fell into place.

Harry thought about how he'd been acting those days. Everyone seemed to have grown tired of him lately. Hermione, Ron, Neville, and even Luna. Harry realised, all of a sudden, that even when he was finally freed from Voldemort, he wasn't allowing himself to move on.

...

"Ron," said Harry one day, "have I been acting like a whiny asshole?"

Ron grinned at that, turned to him sideways, said "yep," and went back to his essay. Then, he sighed, and put down his quill.

"Harry, we get it. It's tough, adjusting. Hell, Hermione was surprised you didn't get some PTSD or something."

He put his hand on Harry's shoulder, rubbing it, and said, "so even if you're whiny, mate, fuck Merlin, you're allowed to be, you're the Boy Who Fucking Killed Voldemort."

"Okay," said Harry, smiling, "but the next time, don't wait for months to say that. I don't bite."

"Yeah, all right," said Ron, smirking.

"And- you moron, did you wipe ink on my robes, Ron.."

...

It was hard, reminding himself to not stress over what had happened. He found that the best way to do that was to indulge in some sort of activity, something to get his mind off of gloom and doom. But there was nothing he could have done to escape his nightmares. So, he didn't sleep. He didn't sleep until his eyes went red and burned with tension, until he was sure he wouldn't dream.

Initially, he began to read. He read novels, stories, even course books. He devoured through the contents of their huge library, much to Hermione's surprise. But then, one day when he was going through his trunk, he found his Cloak at the bottom, and the map. A reminiscent smile creeped upon his face, and it stretched into a grin as he draped the Cloak about him, studying himself in the mirror, much like the first time he'd done that. He felt foolish and giddy.

That night, Harry Potter walked the corridors of Hogwarts again. His map was in his hand, and he was surprised to see how many of his fellow mates were out and about, slow footsteps haunting the map, and nameplates, lonely ones in bathroom stalls, and couples huddled together in quiet corners.

He was so busy spying who was awake on every floor, he didn't realise the two nameplates making their way towards him, until at the last moment. Out of habit, he stood in a corner, and Draco Malfoy and Pansy Parkinson, coversing in whispers, passed by him without a hitch. Harry had no business following them, but couldn't help it when he heard his name whispered. After all, Malfoy could be planning something. Or not, but Harry had to be sure, didn't he?

"... oh, you have no idea how fucking shocked I was! And by the way, even now, I don't get what you see in that Potter. I mean, Theo's so much hotter..."

"Yeah, I know how hot Theo is; Pans, I've fucked him, but Potter is... he's not schoolbook hot, but he's got that raw stuff that makes me go.. like when he's irritated, he scratches his nose, and when he's blushing, he adjusts his glasses, and Godric' balls, don't get me started on Quidditch, when he's in that uniform and he's sweaty and.."

Harry stopped in his tracks, allowing them to go on. It was difficult to breathe, and he realised his eyes were wide as saucers.

Malfoy fancied him. Malfoy fancied him. Malfoy fancied him!

He didn't know why, but it filled him with excitement to think that Malfoy fantasised about him. He didn't know Malfoy was gay, and had fucked that other pretty Slytherin. Harry knew that he wasn't gay, but...

The next day, he woke up smiling, and felt stupid. He felt gigantically stupid the whole day. He didn't know how to act, especially in front of Malfoy. At breakfast, when Malfoy looked at him from the other end of the Great Hall, for a brief moment, the other two tables between them, Harry must've been smiling like an idiot, because Malfoy's thin eyebrows gathered in confusion, and he went back to his plate the next second.

"Harry, what is up with you?" Hermione asked, looking over at the Slytherin table before addressing him.

"What?"

"Are you alright?"

"Fantastic. Why do you ask?"

"Nothing." She eyed Ron, who shrugged, and they dropped it. Ginny narrowed her eyes a little, and then sighed.

Before Quidditch practice, Harry kept studying himself in the mirror, adjusting his glasses, scratching his nose, running his hand through his hair. Ron and the others gave him more than one odd looks that day, and most of all, Ginny. It was no surprise when Draco happened to be in the stands with Parkinson, and Harry was so intent on showing off that Ginny asked him if he was on some potion.

That night, Harry peered at the map, looking for Malfoy's name. He wasn't fighting sleep. He was genuinely excited, and he hadn't felt so much like himself in a long time. He had probably been smiling the entire day, and the goofy smile was still plastered on his face as he scanned the map for the Slytherin's name.

"There," he said.

He stopped just as he entered Myrtle's bathroom. He saw Malfoy sitting on the marble floor beneath a sink, cross-legged. He had a book of sorts in his hand, and he appeared to be writing. No, drawing. Now this was another surprise. Harry didn't know what to do.

He wanted to take a look at whatever Malfoy was drawing, but he wasn't sure he wouldn't make a sound. It never occurred to him that this was a terrible invasion of the other boy's privacy.

Suddenly, Malfoy's face reddened and contorted in a painful cringe, and it seemed that he was about to cry, but he swallowed it. That is, for a brief moment, until it returned. It was as if there was an animal inside Malfoy that wanted to escape, making attempts in sudden bursts. His chest swelled and flattened like bellows, his fists clenched and he shut his eyes tight, and then opened them, and shut them again repeatedly. A few seconds of this, and Malfoy returned to his work, as if nothing was wrong. Then, a tear slipped out of his eye, ran down his blank face and fell on the page. Draco soundlessly wiped his cheek, frowned a little at the page, wiped that too, and resumed.

The next time it came, it was as if it caught Draco off-guard. His chest swelled and tears ran down both his eyes as breath escaped him in a rush, and Harry heard the sound, the softest sob. He went downhill after that, abandoning his sketchbook and gathering his knees upto his face, cradling himself, screaming silently in his arm as he continued to shake, tears spilling over his shirt. Harry didn't know what he was supposed to do.

He took a step back. What he had done was terribly wrong. He imagined himself in Draco's shoes, and cursed himself. Without a sound, he walked out of the bathroom into the hallways and sped fast to the dorms. There was a heavy sadness settling in his chest, and he kept going back to Draco. He had seen him cry before, but this time, it was different, somehow. It saddened him to an extent where his own pain began to peak its head out of where he'd buried it.

Harry slid into his bed, and allowed himself to live it all. Everything he had flushed out of his mind came back to him. Sirius, and Remus, and Fred, and Tonks. The Dursleys, his parents, Dumbledore, Ginny, Draco. By the time sleep lulled him into her arms, his pillow was wet with silent tears and he was so tired that he didn't dream a thing that night.


End file.
